Life is Beautiful and so is Bella

Ah yes, the movie Bella.

Perhaps you’ve heard of it?

I attended this movie on Sunday with a very good group of ladies. Before I launch into my review of it, however, I wanted to share with you a quick story.

One hour prior to my leaving for the movie, I was holding a brand new baby girl. My neighbor had been caring for her all weekend, as the baby’s mother was back in the hospital being treated for an infection.

My neighbor said that the mother, a young single woman from Mexico, had been considering abortion. Fortunately, she went to the Missionaries of Charity here in town for help. They called my neighbor, who is fluent in Spanish, to spend some time with this young lady and hopefully dissuade her from her decision.

You already know the end of the story—thanks be to God—but what I want to emphasize in telling it (and in posting this review of Bella) is that the mother of this baby girl originally thought that she had only two options before her: aborting her child or keeping her. Adoption was not considered because “How could I ever give up my baby?”

It’s an either-or thought process that the pro-choice lobby has used successfully to manipulate their victims. It’s also a lie, of course, and I am thrilled that the movie Bella takes it on.

Bella is pro-life, pro-adoption, pro-women and pro-family. Do you need to know anything more than that?

Well, Eduardo Verástegui (José) is as startlingly handsome an actor as you’re going to see on the big screen; even better, though, is his talent for showing his reverence for life without saying a word. Did you read about his reversion to the Catholic faith? It shows.

I was not familiar with the actress Tammy Blanchard before this movie, but she is a sweetie and reminded me of Julia Roberts (whose acting I love). Blanchard sparkles as the character of Nina, an unwed mother called to make an extremely difficult decision, and does an outstanding job in a very powerful role.

The members of José’s family are also delightful—the kind of food-loving, fun-loving people that you’d love to spend the day with. The scenes at his house were, for me, the highlight of the film because they conveyed the very joy and wisdom and silliness that I hope to maintain in my family.

Bella can be a tiny bit sentimental at times, but that doesn’t detract from the power of this film. My favorite moments were the ones where the characters’ facial expressions conveyed more than the script asked them—the blind man who loved flowers, for example, or the little girl getting videotaped by her mother. (Be warned: you will need to bring your tissues to this movie.)

There are unanswered questions throughout Bella, which is appropriate because that’s life.

Life is fragile; life’s a gift. We can never take it for granted.

Please go to Bella if you haven’t already. Go twice and bring new friends. The fact is that people are clamoring for movies of this caliber, and the better it does at the box office, the more we’ll be seeing of movies like it.

Ad Jesum per Mariam,